Public support for nuclear power generation has decreased in Japan since the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident in March 2011. This study examines how the factors influencing public acceptance of nuclear power changed after this event. The influence factors examined are perceived benefit, perceived risk, trust in the managing bodies, and pro-environmental orientation (i.e., new ecological paradigm). This study is based on cross-sectional data collected from two online nationwide surveys: one conducted in November 2009, before the nuclear accident, and the other in October 2011, after the accident. This study’s target respondents were residents of Aomori, Miyagi, and Fukushima prefectures in the Tohoku region of Japan, as these areas were the epicenters of the Great East Japan Earthquake and the locations of nuclear power stations. After the accident, trust in the managing bodies was found to have a stronger influence on perceived risk, and pro-environmental orientation was found to have a stronger influence on trust in the managing bodies; however, perceived benefit had a weaker positive influence on public acceptance. We also discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

Mobile leapfrogging refers to the process by which new Internet users access the Internet using mobile phones and not PCs. This study examines how and whether mobile phones narrow the digital divide among Indonesian people at four levels (device ownership, Internet adoption, use, and information acquisition). A self-administered questionnaire survey was conducted in three large cities in Indonesia (N = 605). The results indicated that, at different levels, younger and more educated people utilize mobile Internet, especially via smartphones. In contrast, feature phones are owned by less educated and older people regardless of income level, but Internet usage on such phones is more prevalent among younger and more educated people. Moreover, the adoption of the PC-based Internet promotes the ownership of smartphones. These results indicate that mobile leapfrogging is the case only with the ownership of feature phones. Furthermore, in comparison with feature phones, smartphones and personal computers are more associated with information handling capacity in daily life. These findings suggest that ICT literacy education is important, and one should not be optimistic about the mobile Internet’s prospects for narrowing the digital divide in developing countries.

More than 21 million monthly active users (MAUs) in Japan read, communicate, and share information with others via Twitter (in May 2013). In this study, we focused on perceived information overload by analyzing the number of tweets received, number of friends, and density of a user’s egocentric network. These three variables were examined using objective data collected through Twitter’s open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). We collected data concerning tweet overload through a web-based survey, and we used an ordered logistic regression analysis to examine the combined data (n = 1277). Results demonstrated that only the number of friends had a significantly positive effect on perceived tweet overload, while the number of tweets received did not produce a significant effect. Although the density of a user’s egocentric network did not demonstrate any significant effect on perceived tweet overload, a significant interaction effect appeared between the number of friends and the density of this network. In other words, findings indicated that a large number of friends strengthened the network density’s effect; by contrast, a smaller number of friends strengthened network density but reduced perceived tweet overload. The findings are discussed in detail in this article.

Against the backdrop of heated debates within and outside Japan regarding Japan’s push for the right to exercise collective self-defense (CSD), the Japanese mass media have reported a series of polls on Japan’s exercise of its right to CSD, with significantly disparate results. In this article, we present one natural experiment and one controlled experiment that show that the disparate outcomes are due to the different ways the options are segmented. We conducted a comparative analysis of two questionnaires, one presenting two options of ‘approve’ and ‘disapprove’ and the other with three options, splitting the option of ‘approve’ into two answers presenting different means of approving the use of the right to CSD. As a result, more respondents chose ‘approve’ when the option was split into two. The result shows that option-splitting expands the respondents’ range of perception and psychological availability, which in turn raises the selection rate. This research implies that inducing the poll results through option-splitting is possible, which might eventually affect the policy-making process in democratic societies where public opinion polls affect policy.

Social value orientations (SVOs) are economic preferences for the distribution of resources – prosocial individuals are more cooperative and egalitarian than are proselfs. Despite the social and economic implications of SVOs, no systematic studies have examined their neural correlates. We investigated the amygdala and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) structures and functions in prosocials and proselfs by functional magnetic resonance imaging and evaluated cooperative behavior in the Prisoner’s Dilemma game. We found for the first time that amygdala volume was larger in prosocials and positively correlated with cooperation, while DLPFC volume was larger in proselfs and negatively correlated with cooperation. Proselfs’ decisions were marked by strong DLPFC and weak amygdala activity, and prosocials’ decisions were marked by strong amygdala activity, with the DLPFC signal increasing only in defection. Our findings suggest that proselfs’ decisions are controlled by DLPFC-mediated deliberative processes, while prosocials’ decisions are initially guided by automatic amygdala processes.

We examined whether mastery goals promote greater score improvement on a cognitive test than performance goals and whether self-compassion and contingency of self-worth moderated the effect. Participants received either mastery or performance goals manipulation, failed on a difficult test, and took the test again after receiving the correct answers. Those with mastery goals showed a greater score improvement than those with performance goals, although post-failure state self-esteem did not differ between the two conditions. Moreover, the goals had a greater effect among (a) those with low rather than high self-compassion and (b) those with high rather than low competition contingency of self-worth. The findings suggest that by framing the task as a challenge rather than a threat, mastery goals encourage people to learn from failure more so than performance goals, especially when under high ego-threat.

The Internet, a global computer network enabling people to send and receive information anywhere in the world, also functions as a local medium of communication. This study focuses on the role of the Internet in transmitting local news and examines the effects of community population concentrations as socio-ecological environments on the use of local news media consumed online and offline. Data from 1367 respondents across 156 Japanese communities were used to analyze the relationships between type of community and type of news source. The findings suggest that people who live in highly populated communities tend more often to use the Internet to access local news, whereas those in less populated communities tend to use more traditional mass media. However, the results of this study did not show a relationship between population concentrations within communities and the acquisition of international news, nor did the social features of residents adequately explain the effects of population concentration on the acquisition of local news. These results are consistent with theoretical predictions based on network externalities, urbanism, and collective action. The findings indicate that local news consumption is embedded in local social contexts in a way that international news is not, reinforcing the importance of urbanism in the information age.

Humans often forward kindness received from others to strangers, a phenomenon called the upstream or pay-it-forward indirect reciprocity. Some field observations and laboratory experiments found evidence of pay-it-forward reciprocity in which chains of cooperative acts persist in social dilemma situations. Theoretically, however, cooperation based on pay-it-forward reciprocity is not sustainable. We carried out laboratory experiments of a pay-it-forward indirect reciprocity game (i.e., chained gift-giving game) on a large scale in terms of group size and time. We found that cooperation consistent with pay-it-forward reciprocity occurred only in a first few decisions per participant and that cooperation originated from inherent pro-sociality of individuals. In contrast, the same groups of participants showed persisting chains of cooperation in a different indirect reciprocity game in which participants earned reputation by cooperating. Our experimental results suggest that pay-it-forward reciprocity is transient and disappears when a person makes decisions repeatedly, whereas the reputation-based reciprocity is stable in the same situation.

Researchers have repeatedly argued that it is important to determine whether the psychometric properties of an emotional competence measure hold in Eastern populations because there may be cultural variability in abilities linked with emotional competence. However, few studies have examined potential differences in an emotional competence measure in Eastern cultures. To fill this gap, we investigated the applicability of the Profile of Emotional Competence to a Japanese population. Results demonstrated measurement and structural invariance across our Japanese and the original Belgian data sets. As was found in the Belgian sample, this measure showed adequate convergent and criterion validity in the Japanese sample. Furthermore, the scores on this measure were stronger predictors of subjective health and happiness in the Japanese than Belgian population. This measure also showed incremental validity. Our results suggest that the Profile of Emotional Competence is applicable to the Japanese population, an Eastern society.

While some previous researchers have found that guilt encourages prosocial behaviour towards a victim at the expense of other people, others have found the opposite, that is, people allocate resources at the expense of themselves. The present research used a hypothetical scenario method to determine which of these patterns would be replicated in the collectivistic context of Japanese society. In addition, we separated the cause of feelings of guilt into having caused harm and being at fault, and examined in more detail the effect of guilt on prosocial behaviour. Our results show that, in line with the second set of previous researchers, participants who were induced to feel guilt for having caused harm were more likely to allocate their resources to their victim at the expense of themselves than were individuals in the no-harm condition. This suggests that differences in social context influence the effect of guilt on prosocial behaviour in different ways.

Old people have considerable experience and wisdom to share with young people; however, young people do not always listen to old people with gratitude. We conducted two studies to examine the effect of regulatory fit on young people’s gratitude toward old advisers. As predicted, young people felt more grateful to old advisers whose advice did not “fit” the advisees’ self-regulatory orientation, whereas young people felt more grateful to young advisers whose advice fit the advisees’ self-regulatory orientation (Web survey in Study 1, lab experiment in Study 2). Using these results, we propose an idea that may promote smoother intergenerational interaction in transmitting experience and wisdom from older to younger generations.

Sexual objectification – seeing or treating a person as a sexual object – has been the topic of considerable investigation. Building from a longstanding recognition of the potential importance of culture in sexual objectification, this paper focuses on the extent to which people in different parts of the world objectify themselves and others. We explored sexual objectification amongst 588 people in seven diverse nations (i.e., Australia, India, Italy, Japan, Pakistan, the UK, and the USA). Participants completed standard measures of self- and other-objectification. The results revealed that culture did affect self- and other-objectification, with objectification emerging more robustly in Australia, Italy, the UK, and the USA than it did in India, Japan, and Pakistan. These findings help support theoretical claims that culture matters for sexual objectification. Future research directions are discussed.

This book chapter shows a potential effect of the VAAs in Japan by asking the following research questions: To what degree do Japanese voters recognize parties’ policy positions correctly? Can Japanese voters identify and vote for the party closest to their policy preference? Whom should VAAs target? By analyzing the internet survey data of the 2010 House of Councillors election, we show that quite a few Japanese voters could not find or incorrectly identify a party close to their policy preference, and voters who have a small amount of correct information are more likely to vote incorrectly. We also found that VAAs is likely to be effective for young, female voters and those who are not usually exposed to political information and indifferent to politics.

General trust constitutes a critical aspect of social capital that facilitates democratic governance and economic prosperity of a society. Despite its theoretical importance, attitudinal measures of general trust often fail to predict actual trusting behavior in laboratory testing. We suspected that the failure of currently available measures of trust in predicting behavioral trust stems from the overly consequentialist approach to defining trust. We proposed that measures of attitudinal trust succeed in predicting behavioral trust when they tap both the responder’s belief that his/her trust will be honored and his/her preference to be a trusting person. We constructed a new measure of general trust that includes both of these aspects. Using a nonstudent sample of trust game players (N = 470), we demonstrated that the newly constructed measure better predicts behavioral trust in a trust game and other related games, especially when the participant’s social-value orientation is controlled.

Parochial altruism — the human inclination toward costly intragroup cooperation and inter-group aggression without expectations of future returns — requires group selection logic to explain its evolution. We examined experimental evidence for three implications of the group selection account: the unconditional nature of intra-group cooperation; the noninstrumental, non-retaliatory, and costly nature of inter-group aggression; and the positive relationship between intra-group cooperation and inter-group aggression. Laboratory experiments revealed no support for the unconditional nature of intra-group cooperation, mostly negative evidence for the noninstrumental, non-retaliatory, and costly nature of inter-group aggression, and mixed evidence for the positive relationship between intra-group cooperation and inter-group aggression. Caution against premature conclusions about the role of group selection in the evolution of parochial altruism is advised.

Humans are niche constructors who create physical and social environments to which they adapt. The social niche construction approach to human behavior analyzes behavior as a strategy to further long-term self-interest given a specific institution — that is, a set of stable and predictable responses from others to one’s own behavior. We illustrate the logic of social niche construction analysis using examples of individualist and collectivist institutions, and explain how independent and interdependent self-construal can be viewed as strategies adapting to and collectively sustaining individualist or collectivist institutions. We discuss how the social niche construction approach is related to similar approaches used in cultural psychology, namely the socioecological approach, intersubjective approach, equilibrium approach, and gene–culture co-evolution approach.

Under the influences of globalization and a long recession, there is an increasing population of marginalized Japanese youth referred to as NEET (Not in Employment, Education, or Training). Past studies have suggested that the social withdrawal of these individuals is a manifestation of a denial of the dominant cultural value of interdependence and a lack of motivation to adhere to it. To present additional evidence, this study addressed the cognitive and emotional consequences of NEET tendencies by examining interdependent orientation measured by one’s desire to engage in social activities (Study 1) and spontaneous attention to vocal tone (Study 2). As expected, an increase of NEET tendencies was associated with a lower desire to engage in social activities and a reduced attention to vocal tone. These results suggest that NEET tendencies decrease interdependent orientation in the Japanese cultural context.

The purpose of this study was to verify the validity of a causal model that was made to predict the consumer’s acceptance of food additives. A new emotional model in which cognitive factors influence emotional factors from the bottom-up was made and the validity of the model was tested. A social survey was conducted in Tokyo, Japan, among 120 female undergraduate students. The results showed that the new emotional model had a higher validity than the conventional emotional model, in which emotional factors influence cognitive factors. This study showed that the influence of cognitive factors, such as perceived risk and perceived benefit, is also effective in an emotional model. This importantly suggests that consumer’s emotions like anxiety and anger can be changed by altering consumer’s cognitions or perceptions.

Positive interpersonal relationships hinge on individuals’ competence in regulating others’ emotions as well as their own. Nevertheless, little is known about the relationship between emotional competence and specific interpersonal behaviors. In particular, it is unclear which situations require emotional competence for extrinsic emotion regulation and whether emotionally competent individuals actually attempt to regulate others’ emotions. To clarify these issues, the current investigation examined the relationship between emotional competence and extrinsic emotion regulation directed toward an ostracized person. The results of Study 1 (N = 39) indicated that interpersonal emotional competence (competence related to others’ emotions) was positively associated with participants’ efforts to relieve the ostracized person’s sadness. In Study 2 (N = 120), this relationship was moderated by the ostracized person’s emotional expression. In particular, participants with high interpersonal emotional competence were more likely to attempt to regulate the sadness of ostracized individuals who expressed neutral affect. In contrast, when the ostracized person expressed sadness, there were no significant relationships between high or low interpersonal emotional competence and extrinsic emotion regulation behavior. These results offer novel insight into how emotionally competent individuals use their competence to benefit others.

Recent research on consumption and subjective well-being has revealed that experiential purchases and prosocial spending promote happiness by enhancing the purchasers’ social relationships. This study (N = 1523) explored whether undergraduate students’ consumption behaviors during summer break would be associated with their post-break happiness, and whether the consumption–happiness relationship would be mediated by a positive influence on their social relationships. The results showed that both experiential purchases and prosocial spending during summer break were associated with greater post-break happiness, but only when these purchases had a positive influence on the purchasers’ social relationships. These effects remained significant after controlling for respondents’ personality traits, financial standing, and sex. Moreover, both experiential purchases and prosocial spending were more likely to have a positive influence on social relationships than luxury purchases. These results are congruent with the recent exposition that experiential purchases and prosocial spending promote happiness by enhancing the purchasers’ social relationships.

We examined whether sense of freedom is an important predictor of well-being, as compared to other typical predictors, across different periods in modern times (1981–2011), and in the East and the West. We applied a meta-analytical approach to the results of a series of multiple regression analyses conducted on six individual waves of Japanese data sets and five individual waves of American data sets from the World Values Survey. The final sample comprised 6389 Japanese and 6176 American respondents during all study periods. The main findings were that sense of freedom was one of the strongest predictors of life satisfaction (a) among several predictors (i.e., health condition, household income, marital status), (b) consistently across waves, and (c) in both Japan and the United States, as typical collectivistic Eastern and individualistic Western countries. We conclude that the greater importance of sense of freedom in ensuring well-being than other typical predictors is applicable to individuals across time and cultures.

Previous studies explored various predictors of network size by examining their effects on mean network size. However, such predictors may not affect the entire distribution of network size uniformly. In the present study, I theoretically predict that extroversion and neuroticism affect the right side of the network size distribution to a greater extent than the left side and test these predictions using quantile regression analysis. The results showed that the effects of extroversion on the size of the inner and outer layers of personal network were significantly greater when the prediction target was the third quartile than when it was the first quartile. The results also showed that although the effects of neuroticism on the inner layer size were significant, that on the outer layer size were not. When the target variable was inner layer size, the relationship between neuroticism and inner layer size was stronger when the prediction target was the third quartile than when it was the first quartile.

We examined whether Japanese culture has become more individualistic by investigating how the practice of naming babies has changed over time. Cultural psychology has revealed substantial cultural variation in human psychology and behavior, emphasizing the mutual construction of socio-cultural environment and mind. However, much of the past research did not account for the fact that culture is changing. Indeed, archival data on behavior (e.g., divorce rates) suggest a rise in individualism in the U.S. and Japan. In addition to archival data, cultural products (which express an individual’s psyche and behavior outside the head; e.g., advertising) can also reveal cultural change. However, little research has investigated the changes in individualism in East Asia using cultural products. To reveal the dynamic aspects of culture, it is important to present temporal data across cultures. In this study, we examined baby names as a cultural product. If Japanese culture has become more individualistic, parents would be expected to give their children unique names. Using two databases, we calculated the rate of popular baby names between 2004 and 2013. Both databases released the rankings of popular names and their rates within the sample. As Japanese names are generally comprised of both written Chinese characters and their pronunciations, we analyzed these two separately. We found that the rate of popular Chinese characters increased, whereas the rate of popular pronunciations decreased. However, only the rate of popular pronunciations was associated with a previously validated collectivism index. Moreover, we examined the pronunciation variation of common combinations of Chinese characters and the written form variation of common pronunciations. We found that the variation of written forms decreased, whereas the variation of pronunciations increased over time. Taken together, these results showed that parents are giving their children unique names by pairing common Chinese characters with uncommon pronunciations, which indicates an increase in individualism in Japan.

Pride is considered to be an emotion related to the attainment of status. People (at least in Canada and Fiji) implicitly associate the pride expression with high status. In a series of four implicit association test (IAT) studies, we explored the implicit association between the pride expression and high status in Japan. Study 1 showed that Japanese participants readily associate the pride expression with high status, and the shame/embarrassment expression with low status. Study 2a, furthermore, confirmed that the pride-high status association is not driven by the shame-low status association, while Study 2b revealed that the pride-high status association cannot be explained by a simple association of pride with general positivity. Finally, Study 3 demonstrated that Japanese participants readily associate the pride expression with high status jobs, and thus conceptually replicated Study 1. Collectively, these studies provide evidence that East Asian people associate the expression of pride with high status.

People generally discount future outcomes, and accordingly accept immediate but smaller gain. This research examined whether this tendency (i.e., delay discounting) is associated with socioeconomic status (SES) and smoking status, and hypothesized that the influence of SES on delay discounting would be moderated by smoking status. Using an Internet survey, 206 participants made choices between receiving hypothetical monetary rewards immediately or with a delay of 1 year. As predicted, the rates of delay discounting were higher as subjective socioeconomic status indicating one’s relative position and standing in a society was lower. Moreover, the tendency was clearer in smokers than in non-smokers, suggesting that cigarette smoking has a moderating effect. In contrast, there was no effect of objective socioeconomic status representing how individuals are able to access valued goods and services.

We investigated psychological adaptation to the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake of 1995, using surveys conducted in 2001, 2003, 2005, and 2011. Respondents whose houses were damaged reported lower life satisfaction, more negative affect, and more health problems than those who did not suffer any damage in all surveys, including in 2011, or 16 years after the earthquake. Likewise, residents with at least one immediate family member who died in the earthquake reported lower life satisfaction, more negative affect, and more health problems than those who did not have any immediate family members killed in all surveys, including in 2011. Surprisingly, the effect of housing damage on subjective well-being remained significant, above and beyond human loss. Equally important, the 2011 survey data showed that pre-existing differences in socioeconomic status between the victims of housing damage and human loss did not change our main findings.

In three experiments, we provide evidence that resource divisibility and expectations of sharing influence the degree to which envy arises in response to another’s superior resources. We manipulated the resource divisibility (e.g., 2 coins worth approximately $5.50 each vs. a single note worth approximately $11) and expectations of sharing were measured (Experiments 1 and 2) and manipulated (Experiment 3). Findings in these three experiments supported our hypothesis that envy would be most strongly experienced in response to others who had highly divisible resources that participants did not believe would be shared. These findings offer novel insights into the adaptive function of envy, which may promote sharing of divisible resources.

A relationship between the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) and behavioral and attitudinal trust has been suggested, but the nature of this relationship has not yet been established. We obtained behavioral trust data from 470 Japanese participants (242 women) aged 20–59 years, together with their levels of general trust and personality traits (NEO-FFI). Saliva buccal swabs were collected from 411 of these 470 participants and used for genotyping of OXTR rs53576. Our participants were found to have more AA alleles (40%) than GG alleles (12%). The GG men were more trusting and also rated higher on attitudinal trust than AA men, and this difference did not diminish when personality traits were controlled for. However, this pattern was not observed among women. In addition, controlling for attitudinal trust reduced the difference in behavioral trust among men to a non-significant level, but the difference in attitudinal trust remained significant when behavioral trust was controlled. These results indicate that the OXTR genotype affects attitudinal trust as part of an individual’s relatively stable disposition, and further affects behavioral trust through changes in attitudinal trust.

This study proposes that self-expression motivation, an aspect of independent/individualistic psychological tendencies, aids in the formation of social relationships when social relationships are open and mobile. In societies characterised by high relational mobility (e.g., North America), which creates market-like competition in social relationships, individuals must express their uniqueness and worthiness to form new social relationships. Self-expression motivation has a relatively weak effect on relationship formation in low relational mobility societies (e.g., Japan), where social relationships are generally predetermined. This hypothesis was examined and supported through a study on dual users of two social networking sites—Facebook and Mixi (the “Facebook of Japan”). As expected, relational mobility was higher on Facebook than on Mixi. Moreover, the association between self-expression motivation and the number of new friends met on Facebook/Mixi was more positive for Facebook than it was for Mixi. The social functionality of independent tendencies is then discussed.

Our research utilized two popular theoretical conceptualizations of implicit self-esteem: 1) implicit self-esteem as a global automatic reaction to the self; and 2) implicit self-esteem as a context/domain specific construct. Under this framework, we present an extensive search for implicit self-esteem measure validity among different cultural groups (Study 1) and under several experimental manipulations (Study 2).

Method

In Study 1, Euro-Canadians (N = 107), Asian-Canadians (N = 187), and Japanese (N = 112) completed a battery of implicit self-esteem, explicit self-esteem, and criterion measures. Included implicit self-esteem measures were either popular or provided methodological improvements upon older methods. Criterion measures were sampled from previous research on implicit self-esteem and included self-report and independent ratings. In Study 2, Americans (N = 582) completed a shorter battery of these same types of measures under either a control condition, an explicit prime meant to activate the self-concept in a particular context, or prime meant to activate self-competence related implicit attitudes.

Results

Across both studies, explicit self-esteem measures far outperformed implicit self-esteem measures in all cultural groups and under all experimental manipulations.

Conclusion

Implicit self-esteem measures are not valid for individual or cross-cultural comparisons. We speculate that individuals may not form implicit associations with the self as an attitudinal object.

Since the March 11 earthquake, Japanese households have been facing a trade-off problem between decreasing dependency on nuclear power generation and avoiding an increase in electricity rates. We analyze this inner conflict quantitatively, adopting two economic–psychological approaches: First, we note that the trade-off causes cognitive dissonance after making a choice that results in a wider desirability gap between the chosen and rejected alternatives. Second, the consumer surplus improves by 11.2% with a no-choice option for suspending judgment in the presence of cognitive dissonance. Third, individual characteristics such as gender and annual household income are significantly correlated with both cognitive dissonance and a preference for the no-choice option.

Literature suggests that social capital, which often promotes human welfare, requires sensitive handling to build and maintain. The current study investigated the role of extension officers (fukyu-shidoin) in Japanese agricultural and fishing communities, who help farmers/fishers in both technical and social matters. Past research found that in Japanese agricultural communities, extension officers’ activities, social skills, and relationships with their colleagues had effects on social capital and problem solving in communities. We conducted a nation-wide survey of fishery extension officers and found that the findings in agricultural communities were largely replicated in fishing communities with only one difference: Officers’ activities to provide a future vision had a positive effect for problem solving in agricultural communities. For fisheries, however, such activities were more effective when the officer had worked for the community for a longer period of time. This could be explained by the higher level of uncertainty in fishing than farming.

A series of culturally shocking events have happened around me since I returned to Japan after a two-and-a-half year experience in the United States with my family. I have readjusted to the size of dishes and drinks, the driving lane, the punctuality, and the working styles. The school environment surrounding my children, however is still frustrating me，although it appears that their education is proceeding well.

This chapter will introduce bukatsu, which is a unique school sport activity in Japan and one of the most frustrating things for me, along with a junior high school environment, to show an aspect of Japanese culture. It does not adopt a style of cross-cultural studies on physicaI education (e.g.，Pühse and Gerber 2005) to avoid a superficial comparison of different societies. On the basis of an autoethnographic study (Ellis et al. 2012) on bukatsu, some tasks of the globalization of education in Japan wiII be discussed. Another study of educational settings in the United States from a parent ‘s perspective (Omi 2012) will be reflected in the discussion.

The watching eyes effect refers to the phenomenon that people behave more altruistically than usual when an eye-image is present in their environment. In this paper, we report two failed replications of the watching eyes effect. In both Studies 1 and 2, participants decided how many coins out of a seven coin endowment (each coin worth 100 Japanese yen) to allocate to a subsequent participant, under the assumption that the prior participant may have left them some coins. In Study 1, participants anonymously made their allocation decision while seated in front of a poster depicting either an eye-image or a geometric pattern. In Study 2, to increase the saliency of the watching eyes, participants were instructed to place the coins in envelopes (one for self and one for the subsequent participant) printed with either an eye-image or a geometric pattern. In both Studies 1 and 2, the number of coins that participants allocated to subsequent participants did not significantly differ between the eye-image and control conditions. Moreover, the proportion of participants who allocated at least one coin to subsequent participants was not significantly different across the two conditions. In our studies, altruism was not increased by watching eyes.

More attention has recently been focused on how a person may choose their emotion regulation strategies depending on the situation. The present research exploratorily examined that how people cognitively appraised a situation, which they actually encountered in their life, affects following use tendency of cognitive emotion regulation strategies. Three hundred and twenty-four participants were instructed to recall the most stressful situation in the last month, and to rate how they cognitively appraised the situation (threat, centrality, controllability, commitment, injustice/unfairness, expectedness, expectancy) and how they cognitively regulated their emotion (self-blame, blaming others, acceptance, refocus on planning, positive refocusing, rumination, positive reappraisal, putting into perspective, catastrophizing). Multiple regression analysis revealed that even after control for other variables, such as age, sex, personality, the time when the situation occurred and the intensity of negative emotion, all criteria of cognitive appraisal except for expectedness predicted cognitive emotion regulation choice. Implications and limitations of this research were discussed.

The aim of this study was to examine group-level group identity (GGI), which is defined as group identity within a whole group and which may be an essential element for a collection of people to be a group. Multilevel structural equation modeling (ML-SEM) was used to test the prediction that GGI would have a positive effect on interaction, emotional bond, and interdependence among group members in the group-level model. If so, GGI could be considered as an essential element for a collection of people to be a group. University students (137 men, 104 women) completed a questionnaire (Study 1) and took part in an experiment in which 32 experimental groups (37 men, 55 women) were formed (Study 2). The results supported the prediction in both studies: GGI had positive influences on interactions, emotional bonds, and interdependence among group members.

In two studies (2010 and 2011), more than 2000 respondents living in Japan were asked whether they gained more happiness from ownership or from taking action. In the 2010 study, many more individuals preferred taking action to ownership; this preference was greater in women than in men and in older people than in younger people. Reasons for this preference were plainly expressed in respondents’ free writing, and a categorical distinction between ownership and taking action was readily recognized and widely shared. Social desirability concerns probably did not play a role in responses. In the 2011 study, many individuals valued action more than ownership as like as the 2010 study. The preference for taking action over ownership was greater in women than in men, in older people than in younger people, and in people with higher levels of education than in people with lower levels of education. There was no relationship with annual income. The correlations with gender and level of education were similar to results of comparable studies conducted in the USA, although in the US studies, experiential purchases were evaluated, rather than taking action; however, the correlation with age was uncertain in the US studies. Further studies with US respondents will be necessary to examine this correlation. Possible reasons why many more people preferred happiness gained from taking action to happiness experienced from ownership were discussed.

Japan’s prototype of depression had traditionally been a melancholic depression based on the premorbid personality “shūchaku-kishitsu” proposed by Mitsuzo Shimoda in the 1930s. However since around 2000, a novel form of depression has emerged among youth. Called ‘modern type depression (MTD)’ by mass media, the term has quickly gained popularity among the general public, though it has not been regarded as an official medical term. Likewise, lack of consensus guidelines for its diagnosis and treatment, and a dearth of scientific literature on MTD has led to confusion when dealing with it in clinical practice in Japan. In this review article, we summarize and discuss the present situation and issues regarding MTD by focusing on historical, diagnostic, psychosocial, and cultural perspectives. We also draw on international perspectives (Kato TA et al. J Affect Dis 2011) that begin to suggest that MTD is a phenomenon that MTD may exist not only in Japan but also in many other countries with different socio-cultural and historical backgrounds. It is therefore of interest to establish whether MTD is a culture-specific phenomenon in Japan or a syndrome that can be classified using international diagnostic criteria as contained in ICD or DSM. We propose a novel diagnostic approach for depression that addresses MTD in order to combat the current confusion about depression under the present diagnostic systems.

Prior studies suggest that psychological difficulties arise from higher trait rejection sensitivity (RS)—heightened vigilance and differential detection of social rejection cues and defensive response to. On the other hand, from an evolutionary perspective, rapid and efficient detection of social rejection cues can be considered beneficial. We conducted a survey and an electrophysiological experiment to reconcile this seeming contradiction. We compared the effects of RS and rejection detection capability (RDC) on perceived interpersonal experiences (Study 1) and on neurocognitive processes in response to cues of social rejection (disgusted faces; Study 2). We found that RS and RDC were not significantly related, although RS was positively related to perceived social rejection experiences and RDC was positively related to perceived social inclusion experiences. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) revealed that higher RS was related to cognitive avoidance (i.e., P1) and heightened motivated attention (i.e., late positive potential: LPP), but not to facial expression encoding (i.e., N170) toward disgusted faces. On the other hand, higher RDC was related to heightened N170 amplitude, but not to P1 and LPP amplitudes. These findings imply that sensitivity to rejection is apparently distinct from the ability to detect social rejection cues and instead reflects intense vigilance and defensive response to those cues. We discussed an alternative explanation of the relationship between RS and RDC from a signal detection perspective.

Parochial altruism — the human inclination toward costly intra-group cooperation and inter-group aggression without expectations of future returns — requires group selection logic to explain its evolution. We examined experimental evidence for three implications of the group selection account: the unconditional nature of intra-group cooperation; the non-instrumental, non-retaliatory, and costly nature of inter-group aggression; and the positive relationship between intra-group cooperation and inter-group aggression. Laboratory experiments revealed no support for the unconditional nature of intra-group cooperation, mostly negative evidence for the non-instrumental, non-retaliatory, and costly nature of inter-group aggression, and mixed evidence for the positive relationship between intra-group cooperation and inter-group aggression. Caution against premature conclusions about the role of group selection in the evolution of parochial altruism is advised.

When individuals estimate something numerically, their estimation tends to be close to a value perceived beforehand, called an anchor. This tendency is called “the anchoring effect.” We introduce three hypotheses – the numeric priming hypothesis, the semantic priming hypothesis, and the magnitude priming hypothesis – that explain the anchoring effect. We apply them to participants\’ estimation of the number of sufferers in order to examine which model explains the anchoring effect best. Experimental results support the numeric priming hypothesis, indicating that the anchoring effect occurs even when no semantic relatedness exists between the number presented as the prime and the successive numerical estimation. Implications for disaster risk communication are discussed based on the results we obtained.

This review introduces the concept of culture-sensitive health communication. The basic premise is that congruency between the recipient’s cultural characteristics and the respective message will increase the communication’s effectiveness. Culture-sensitive health communication is therefore defined as the deliberate and evidence-informed adaptation of health communication to the recipients’ cultural background in order to increase knowledge and improve preparation for medical decision making and to enhance the persuasiveness of messages in health promotion. To achieve effective health communication in varying cultural contexts, an empirically and theoretically based understanding of culture will be indispensable. We therefore define culture, discuss which evolutionary and structural factors contribute to the development of cultural diversity, and examine how differences are conceptualized as scientific constructs in current models of cultural differences. In addition, we will explicate the implications of cultural differences for psychological theorizing, because common constructs of health behavior theories and decision making, such as attitudes or risk perception, are subject to cultural variation. In terms of communication, we will review both communication strategies and channels that are used to disseminate health messages, and we will discuss the implications of cultural differences for their effectiveness. Finally, we propose an agenda both for science and for practice to advance and apply the evidence base for culture-sensitive health communication. This calls for more interdisciplinary research between science and practice but also between scientific disciplines and between basic and applied research.

The present study examined associations of neighbourhood crime with residents’ social ties and civic participation using multilevel models. We hypothesized that crime is indirectly associated with residents’ low civic participation by negatively relating to their acquaintanceship ties because of fear of neighbours. By contrast, we predicted that crime is indirectly related to frequent civic participation by positively associating with more intimate friendship ties as a response to combat external threats. Additionally, we hypothesized that high crime rates in the neighbourhood increases the importance of generalized trust towards others. Therefore, we examined the interaction effects of neighbourhood crime and trust on social ties and participation. The study is based on a postal questionnaire mailed to residents aged between 20 and 69 years, residing in Musashino City and Kiyose City, in Tokyo. Rates of larceny reported by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department were used as indices of neighbourhood crime. As hypothesized, our results showed that crime is positively associated with friendship ties and is negatively related to acquaintanceship ties. Through these opposing relationships, crime showed both positive and negative associations with civic participation. Moreover, we found that generalized trust buffered the adverse relationships between crime, broader social ties and participation.

Due to the ever-present allure of potentially more appealing or attractive partners, people in mutually committed relationships face a commitment problem (i.e., uncertainty about partner fidelity). This problem exists for both friendship and romantic relationships. In an exploratory pilot study, participants described real-life commitment-confirming incidents in either friendship or romantic relationships. The results revealed that the same types of pro-relationship acts (e.g., throwing a surprise party) were used to communicate commitment to one’s partner in both types of relationship. Using signaling theory, we predicted that costly commitment signals would be more effective than non-costly commitment signals (Hypothesis 1). Also, we predicted that failure to engage in such behaviors would communicate non-commitment, and that such failures would have a more detrimental effect on romantic relationships than friendship (Hypothesis 2). Two scenario experiments (study 1 in Japan and study 2 in the U.S.)were conducted to test these hypotheses. The results showed that costly commitment signals were more effective than non-costly commitment signals in both Japan and the U.S. In addition, the absence of situationally appropriate commitment signals (e.g., forgetting a special occasion) was substantially more damaging to romantic relationships than to friendship.

Many experiments have demonstrated that people are willing to incur cost to punish norm violators even when they are not directly harmed by the violation. Such altruistic third-party punishment is often considered an evolutionary underpinning of large-scale human cooperation. However, some scholars argue that previously demonstrated altruistic third-party punishment against fairness-norm violations may be an experimental artefact. For example, envy-driven retaliatory behaviour (i.e. spite) towards better-off unfair game players may be misidentified as altruistic punishment. Indeed, a recent experiment demonstrated that participants ceased to inflict third-party punishment against an unfair player once a series of key methodological problems were systematically controlled for. Noticing that a previous finding regarding apparently altruistic third-party punishment against honesty-norm violations may have been subject to methodological issues, we used a different and what we consider to be a more sound design to evaluate these findings. Third-party punishment against dishonest players withstood this more stringent test.

This study explores the association between nation brand personality and product evaluation. Conducting an online questionnaire survey in Japan that used the quota sampling method (N=880), the product evaluation of various products (leather shoes, smartphones, movies, automobiles, shirts, mineral water and tour preference) was measured for seven countries (China, Germany, India, Italy, the United States, South Korea and Vietnam). A factor analysis yielded three nation brand personality dimensions (sincerity, competence and warmth), two of which are predicted by the stereotype content model. China was evaluated the lowest on all three dimensions, and China’s brand personality was most negatively correlated with consumer ethnocentrism among seven countries. The contact hypothesis was only partially supported for nation brand personalities. Nation brand personalities were associated with product evaluations in different ways depending on product category. Competence was positively correlated with the evaluation of all the products, while the warmth was positively correlated with the evaluation of fashion-related products and movies. Sincerity was positively correlated with the evaluation of high-tech products and mineral water. Tour preference was most strongly correlated with nation liking. The article discusses implications for nation branding strategies on the basis of these findings.

Love, sex, and money are the most direct cues involved in the fundamental forms of mate preferences. These fundamental forms are not mutually exclusive but are interrelated. As a result, humans base their mate choices on multiple cues. In this study, 62 undergraduate women (M age = 20.4 yr., SD = 1.4) from China and Japan served as the participants. They performed a variation of the semantic priming task, in which they were instructed to decide by means of a key-press whether the target was human or non-human. The primes were images that portrayed potent evolutionary factors for mate preference (i.e., love, sex, and money), and the manipulation was based on whether the prime and target matched regarding gender, independent of the target decision task (human vs non-human). Participants gave faster responses to male targets than to female targets under priming. The results generally supported the evolutionary premises that assume mate preference is determined by fundamental forms of providing emotional (love), material (money), and fertility support (sex). The money priming effect was stronger in the Chinese women than in the Japanese women, suggesting that social context may influence mate preferences.

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the young listener’s reaction on the development of generativity and narratives of elderly people. Thirty-four males between the ages of 60 and 82 participated in this experiment in which the listener generations (young/elderly) and listener reactions (empathic/neutral) were controlled. The participants shared and taught their wisdom gained from their past experiences through narratives. Results showed that many elderly people spoke about “lessons from experiences of failure” when there was an empathic reaction from young people, and such narratives were promoted by an increase of generativity. These results suggested the impact of the younger people’s reaction on the elderly people’s psychological development and behavior.

In Japan, the number of dementia patients admitted to hospitals and other care facilities has been increasing and their hospital stays prolonged. Until now, there has been no study examining the differences between patients in psychiatric hospitals and other care facilities. Here we attempt a comparative analysis of characteristics of dementia patients in psychiatric hospitals and other types of facilities based on a nationwide survey.

Method

A nationwide, cross-sectional survey was conducted in 2009–2011. Questionnaires were sent to randomly selected facilities and asked about each facility’s status as of September 2009 and about individuals with dementia residing in each facility during the 2008 fiscal year. The portion about individuals consisted of items to assess eligibility for the Long-Term Care Insurance programme. Based on data from 6121 patients residing in seven different types of facilities, features of dementia patients in psychiatric hospitals and differences among facilities were analyzed.

Results

There was a significant difference in average age, activities of daily living level, and dementia severity level among the seven types of facilities. The average age in all types of facilities, except for psychiatric hospitals, was higher than the national average life expectancy of 82.59 years. The results of the study revealed that in psychiatric hospitals the proportion of men, those aged <75 years, demented patients with severe behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, and those with frontotemporal dementia was significantly greater than in other types of facilities. In other Long-Term Care Insurance care facilities, dementia patients >80 years and women accounted for 80% of all patients.

Conclusion

Result showed that dementia patients in psychiatric hospitals had a higher proportion of men, younger age groups, and severe dementia than other types of facilities. These features contrast markedly with status of dementia patients in other Long-Term Care Insurance care facilities. In order to facilitate dementia patients’ early discharge from psychiatric hospitals to other care facilities or to home, further fulfilment care services corresponding to severe dementia and early-onset dementia may be needed.